No More Running
by Misty Reeyus
Summary: "Soooo there's absolutely no reason you're hanging around my door at three in the morning?"
Karol knows how silly he's being even as he tiptoes down the hall to Yuri's room in the dead of night, even as he grabs the handle and cautiously turns. It's unlocked, as per usual—Yuri often keeps his door closed but he doesn't tend to lock it unless he _absolutely_ needs the privacy—so Karol slowly cracks open the door to peek inside, his gaze immediately locking onto the dark lump beneath the sheets. He's being silly, but all Karol needs right now is to see Yuri move, to hear Yuri breathe, and after that, Karol will definitely be calm enough to just close the door and head back to bed and forget this all ever happened—

The lump abruptly shifts on the mattress, and Karol _jumps_ as a head pops up from the pillow and bleary eyes meet his own startled ones.

"Karol?" Yuri mumbles sleepily, rubbing fists into his sockets. "What is it? You need something?"

Karol flushes hard. This was stupid after all; of course Yuri's perfectly fine and of course Karol's just being a baby over some silly nightmare.

"N-no," Karol answers. "Nothing at all."

Yuri frowns, clearly skeptical. "Soooo there's absolutely _no_ reason you're hanging around my door at"—he glances to the clock on his bedside table—"three in the morning?"

Karol opens his mouth to try and affirm that yes, there's no reason whatsoever. But then the memory flashes before his eyes again—that's partly what it was: a memory, and not just a dream, because he wouldn't be this messed up if it had _only_ been a dream—and as he recalls the vision of Yuri and the others down on their knees, in helpless agony, screaming desperate words through the wind and snow, Karol's own words die on his tongue. Eventually, when nothing comes out, Karol closes his mouth altogether.

Yuri hums thoughtfully.

"You wanna come in?" he offers, and Karol considers it only a moment before nodding, quickly slipping inside and shutting the door behind him.

"Alright then." Yuri reaches over to switch on his bedside lamp, then rolls over to make room as Karol hesitantly takes a seat on the edge of his bed. "What's going on here?"

Karol bites his lip, eyes trailing down to focus intently on the diamond-patterned quilt.

"I had a bad dream," he murmurs, fidgeting slightly, because admitting it out loud makes him feel like such a kid. Admittedly, he's thirteen, technically he _is_ a kid—but he's also the boss of a guild. And although he knows Yuri won't judge him for something like this, Karol's still kinda embarrassed that a simple nightmare managed to shake him up this bad.

Yuri pushes himself up into a sitting position on the mattress, once-tired eyes now entirely focused and alert. "Wanna talk about it?"

"W-well, I…" Karol pauses, forces himself to inhale deeply, and allows the tension in his shoulders to leave through the exhale. He raises his head to stare straight at Yuri—because Yuri is here, Yuri is breathing beside him, Yuri's mouth is pursed with concern and his eyes are alight with the glow of the lamp. Yuri is perfectly _fine_ and Karol needs to see that with his own two eyes so he can clutch onto it with everything he's got.

"We were in Zophier," Karol begins, once he finds his voice again. "We found the aer krene, and then Baitojoh attacked us, and then you guys were all trapped and I was the only one who got out."

Yuri knows this story, of course. His brow furrows with recollection but he doesn't interrupt, so Karol continues.

"You were all frozen in place, you couldn't move. It was going to kill you guys and I was the only one who could do something about it, but I was so scared that I…" The words get stuck in his throat so Karol breathes in, tries to steady his shaky voice before forcing them out. "I…I ran away, Yuri. I ran and I ran and I didn't stop until I was far gone, and when I finally forced myself to look back, you…you were all…"

Karol trails off. He doesn't want to keep going.

Yuri grabs him gently by the shoulders, and that tells Karol he doesn't have to.

"I knew it wasn't real," Karol says, swallowing hard but failing to dislodge the ever-growing lump in his throat. "But even so, I just…I came here because I needed to see that you were okay."

And Karol has gotten what he came for, yet his body still trembles as he glances back down at the quilt, clenching his fists in it. Even if his dream wasn't what really happened, it _could_ have been. He could have run from Baitojoh, just like he had run from danger so many times before that—hell, how can Karol be sure that he won't run again in the future—

"Karol," Yuri calls, firmly squeezing his shoulders, and Karol blinks up into a steadfast, unyielding gaze. "You _didn't_ run. We were all screaming at you to run, we were _begging_ you to run, but you didn't." Yuri stares a moment, then smirks, gently digging his knuckles into Karol's hair to deliver a light noogie. "You know, I've never been so happy to be disobeyed in my entire life."

Even as he groans and swats Yuri's hand away, Karol can't help but quirk an amused smile. "Are you saying I should disobey you more often?"

"I'm saying that we're all alive because you looked out for your own. That's what you do, that's what _we_ do." Yuri pumps his fist out in what Karol's recognizes as a very subdued imitation of his own usual rallying pose. "All for the guild and the guild for all, right?"

Karol chuckles at the familiar catchphrase, letting himself cling to the truth it holds. Looking out for each other _is_ what they do; the others have been there to save Karol's butt countless times before, and that's why Karol was able do what he did to save theirs back in Zopheir.

That's why Karol knows he can keep going now.

"Yeah. You're right," Karol admits, already feeling a lot better. "Thanks Yuri."

"No problem," Yuri says, gently rapping Karol on the forehead. "So can you go back to sleep now?"

Karol nods. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm good."

With that, he hops down from the mattress to let his feet hit the floor—only to yank up the edge of the blankets and slide back into bed beneath them. Yuri blinks down at him in surprise, but Karol just grins cheekily back; he's already here, after all, and now that Karol has the company, he sees no point in going back to an empty room to sleep alone.

"…Okay," Yuri finally agrees, laughing as he reaches over to turn off the lamp. In the darkness, he recedes back beneath the sheets himself, and Karol doesn't miss the way an arm drapes securely, almost _protectively_ over his own torso as Yuri lies back down. "Good night."

"Mmhmm," Karol replies, and eagerly leans into Yuri's warmth. "Sweet dreams."


End file.
